September 15, 1999
Pathfinder teacher spends summer vacation in India
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
If you can turtle without going loco, you are ready to travel in India for an extended visit.
To turtle, as in a verb, is the quaint way of describing a bus that has flipped over onto its roof - not a big deal, really. Passengers exit, wait for the next bus and go on their way. Just another wrinkle in the routine of life in India.
Mary Oberlin experienced her first turtle this summer in India during her three-month stay there. A technology teacher at the Pathfinder School, Oberlin discovered that this is one experience she no longer has to worry about and that surviving a turtle, like traveling, is a matter of faith, going with the flow.
"The one thing about India, if you go over there you come back changed," Oberlin said. "You come back with a whole different list of priorities: family, friends, your health. It makes me really appreciate what I have and that possessions don't matter anymore."
The Oberlins spent three months in India three summers ago and plan to return again in the next few years. This trip, they left just after school ended and spent two days traveling to Bombay. After clearing customs, they took a taxi to downtown Bombay and just went from there.
They took just one small backpack each, one change of clothes and a bathing suit, and some e-mail addresses to keep in touch with family back home. This time they visited villages and cities they missed last time and also made it to northern India and Nepal. They spent three weeks in the southern state of Goa and the final weeks in Bombay.
No matter where they went, they were amazed at the friendliness of the people, the eagerness of natives of all ages to practice English with them. Even this summer's tensions between India and Pakistan did not affect the day-to-day life of the Indian population.
"India is like a second home to me, the people are so wonderful there," Oberlin said. "I met a young girl on the street and she invited me home. I went to this family's home and they insisted we have dinner, gave me a sari and the dots for my forehead and took me to the zoo. I would not hesitate to accept an invitation in India."
Oberlin and her husband again found the extreme poverty of large segments of people stunning, where kids spent their lives as street children begging for a living, without parents or schooling. Still these kids were usually friendly and eager to talk to the foreigners. Sometimes she would see children seven years old toting around a baby brother or sister because their parents were gone.
"One thing that really impressed me is that everyone takes care of else," Oberlin said. "If one kid gets a few rupees and buys some bread, he does not eat it himself he shares it with his friends."
Traveling is a passion for Oberlin and her husband, who take every summer to travel to distant lands and live for an extended period. They get to know the native culture and people as much as possible, living directly with them. In the past they have lived in Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong, Java, Oman and Indonesia. They have also toured all over South American continent.
"We take our savings each year and travel in the summertime," Oberlin said. "We send e-mail messages back to my family who always think I'm crazy. My brothers and sisters never travel."
This time in India, they visited numerous schools and brought back books, colored oils and a silver stamp and a sari. Oberlin and the first grade teacher at the school, Lynn Pavlov, pooled their materials funds to purchase these items, which will be used in January when the kindergarten through fourth graders complete a month-long unit on India.
To make the storybooks more accessible to the students, Oberlin hired some Indian schoolchildren to translate the text from the languages of Hindi or Kannada into English. They also established some e-mail links so students at the Pathfinder School can communicate with classrooms in India, swapping information about daily life, schoolwork and culture.
"Their schools have just benches and a blackboard, no books, no desks," said Oberlin, who found school kids always begging for pens. "They all wear uniforms and their parents have to pay for their education, so only the very fortunate get to go."